Where the Mirror Has No Face
by theleonhearted
Summary: (It was always you. The only one to find the bottom; the only one to know my mind.) Wanda seeks her brother in the strangest of places.


The first place she tries is the silver-stained mirror that her mother left behind.

Well, no; that's not quite so. The first place she tries is List's armoire, recalling lukewarm memories of passages and universes and the backs of wardrobes. She'd swept through layers of old fabric and abandonment, coats of cowskin and fur and soft goat's wool that diverted Wanda's attention from her own mind. Admittedly rather small, her forward path ended abruptly (but oh, doesn't the exit look _delightfully_ far away?); she had offered a timid knock to the east wall, like a polite query. And yes, she'd been hoping that it would be that simple, so the ugly swell of disappointment in the belly of her throat was only to be expected.

But no; that experience had been nothing more than a child's game and this is where she begins her quest: in the tiny bathroom within her quarters where she guards her mother's powder-puffs and glass bottles, the tiny mirror clutched in her hands.

She examines the glass as she would a face, element by element — the frosted surface, the worn frame. And wonders, absently, whether this item was meant only for pictures of another life, another person (wonders whether she and the mirror are the same). The mirror cannot read her face; Wanda cannot enchant herself.

She remembers, though. Holes in your body. Holes in your head. His, hers, theirs. Ours. (It's no different from how it's always been, but at least you gave it your all.)

Anxious, she scans the array of fragile bottles in their peculiar shapes: this one a lozenge, this one a pear, this a triangle inverted on end; she's arranged them with clinical precision, lined up so they touch just so and stored away from where frantic-flailing fingers might reach (and _really_ , perhaps you ought to be more careful with your hands, or acquire a pair of gloves? These things can hurt when they cut deep, and sometimes, you move so _fast_.).

Sometimes, sometimes you lose even me. ( _Sestra_.)

Her eyes snap open. She's in, the mirror twisting in her hands — into the wardrobe, into the depths of her mind. She reaches her fist out and knocks. There's no fairy story this time, no child's game; just a quick, pleading rap of the knuckles into space.

(She tries to imagine his face, tries to cloak herself in his voice, his laughter, his touch. She tries to hear the rattle of the gun, taste metal, sink her fingers into the wounds and stitch them with magic.) But she can still feel the cool of the bathroom faucet, pressing welts into her skin. She can smell talcum powder in the air.

Sometimes, sometimes you lose even _me_. (Pietro. Pietro, bring me back.)

She hadn't realized how desperately she sought to manipulate her own thoughts. The pathways snake out in all directions and she knocks and knocks, leaving dusty finger-streaks and bits of memory like breadcrumb trails (his eyes, his hair, the warm nest of his arms). She fails, she falls, and tries again. Time passes in words — gentle urges of encouragement and soothing praises after training, from the Captain especially. In her new suit, she is another fish learning to fly. (He said let us be more. He said where you are, I will be also. He said we will always and forever be. He said.)

Time passes, yes. They all have words for her. Their thoughts they keep hidden, but Wanda knows them with a glance. It's no different from how it's always been. (But you give it your all.)

She avoids mirrors. These are likely her best opportunity, but she knows how mirrors can be deceptively emotive, and she can think of nothing more vile than to be trapped half-inside, half-not.

(Even if half is half more than she can currently claim.)

Sometimes she escapes. One day she sees a large man on the street, greed in his eyes, staining his thoughts. Men who see red, and men who see green: there is no difference, not in the end ( _he said_ ). Watch out, thick man, Wanda wants to say, and maybe does. Money is a twisted muse. (He _laughed_.)

She's made people see death; she's made people see stars. There's a particularly bad moment, in the throng of the city streets, where she thought she glimpsed something gliding beside her reflection; she found, seconds before launching herself at the ghost, that she had been staring into another of those terrible office-tower windows. A salaryman dashed across the lobby on the other side.

And yes, she tries to avoid mirrors, but there's _something_ peeking in the dark-and-silver blot of one of Stark's machines (the color of shrapnel) she thinks, and loses herself in the screen (I'm coming, brother, I'm coming!). Soon she'll reach the bottom, she _has_ to, and she's pounding it as hard as she can (blood tastes like kisses and half-held tears, but her hands glow red through the pain because she _needs_ to destroy the limits of this stupid, _stupid_ brain). She can feel arms around her, hoisting her up, up, up and out of the dark and the slightest hint of silver-blue eyes before a terrifyingly angry _someone_ screams "What the _fuck_ is she doing to my computer?" And then, again, she is all alone.

In the bathroom which houses her mother's cosmetics, while she towels her shower-damp hair, she sets her eyes on that little mirror. The glass is dark — like Stark's computer, like an abandoned wardrobe, like Wanda's mind — but she wonders at the face she sees staring back (wonders when her hair changed styles, or when her eyes became that shade of blue.)

(Wonders when the magic started working.)

Then, with water still dripping down her shoulders, she leans against the sink and — like a polite query, though we never were polite — knocks at her reflection.

The image in the mirror gives a hearty grin back.

( _It was always you. The only one to find the bottom; the only one to know my mind_.)

She sees it then, the doorway inching open just for her on the other side of the spotted glass. The sweet mirth of his laughter fills her, even as she ties up her still-wet hair and tosses her towel to the floor and slips her hand, glowing, into the mirrored one waiting for her.


End file.
